The New Jersey Supreme Court ruled that gay couples are entitled to civil rights, and stopped short of endorsing gay marriage. But in this election season, we can expect the right wing opportunists to appeal to their constituents' bigotry and homophobia as yet another Scare Out the Vote tactic.

In a ruling that fell short of what either side wanted or feared, the state Supreme Court declared 4-3 that homosexual couples are entitled to the same rights as heterosexual ones.

This radical concept that Constitutional rights and equal protection under the law are not contingent upon having the "correct" sexual orientation is just too much for the radical right, who consider sexual orientation a choice and believe everyone should choose to not be homosexual, as they have done.

GOP Assemblyman Richard Merkt said he would seek to have all seven justices impeached. "Neither the framers of New Jersey's 1947 constitution, nor the voters who ratified it, ever remotely contemplated the possibility of same-sex marriage," Merkt said.

Homosexuality did not exist before television, I suppose. Back when New Jersey joined the Union, men were men, women were barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen, and children were to be beaten and not heard.

Of course, perhaps we should all have a little sympathy for people like Richard Merkt, who feel so strongly the need for the State to impose laws to prevent them from being homosexual. Maybe we each can pitch in a nickel to get Republican Merkt some therapy for his apparent shame.

Meanwhile, homophobes can take comfort that the 4-3 decision did not go the other way:

"Although we cannot find that a fundamental right to same-sex marriage exists in this state, the unequal dispensation of rights and benefits to committed same-sex partners can no longer be tolerated under our state Constitution," Justice Barry T. Albin wrote for the four-member majority.

The court said the Legislature "must either amend the marriage statutes to include same-sex couples or create a parallel statutory structure" that gives gays all the privileges and obligations married couples have.

The three dissenters argued that the majority did not go far enough. They demanded full marriage for gays.

Civil rights. Only in this day and age of Republican-backed torture and gutting of habeas corpus can the mere mention of civil rights be considered so threatening.